The Roosters

Tuesday night

I was wandering in a record store when I came across a treasure trove: two big boxes of picture-sleeve singles, lined up back-to-back for easy browsing. I began sorting through them, looking for some 45s to add to my collection. About halfway through the first box, I found a real rarity, and couldn't believe my luck. It was a four-song 45 r.p.m. e.p. (extended-play single) by a punk band called The Roosters, and it had been manufactured by the group itself, in an extremely limited quantity. The cover was made of white card stock, and featured black type and graphics that looked as though they had been created with a Xerox machine. The record contained two punky covers of rock and roll oldies, and two original songs. The sleeve was still shrink-wrapped, but it had been in the box forever, so the plastic was open at the top. The photos on the back cover were amateurish at best, and betrayed the boys' sense of humor. One of them was shown in a side-view, posed bent over and pantless, with a large feather duster rubber-banded to his bum, feathers pointed toward the ceiling. (That was his rooster tail, in case anyone missed the point.)

In any case, the most exciting thing about this find was that The Roosters later morphed into a more polished pop-rock band called "Fountains of Wayne." I was holding their first record in my hands, and it was quite a rarity. What was even better was that the record store didn't know what it had; the sticker on the back of the sleeve was priced at $1.10. I thought, "Well, I can bring this home and add it to my collection, or maybe I'll sell it on e-bay for $1,000. Either way, I win."

*****

I am a fan of Fountains of Wayne, but, unfortunately, their alter-ego, The Roosters, are a figment of my imagination. Lord knows where that feather duster idea came from. What a hoot!

I sure did like shopping for records, evidenced by this dream, as well as "Collection" (11/12/07), "45s" (9/26/07) and "Vinyl Days" (8/28/07). I also used to enjoy going to record conventions, and was always hoping to find a rarity or two. This dream was probably inspired by my searches for early singles by major bands before they made it big, such as R.E.M.'s first pressing of "Radio Free Europe" on the Hib-Tone label, or the Police's little-known debut single, "Fallout/ Nothing Achieving."